


Desaturated

by FluffNStuff



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Armor Color, Clone armor, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Just kind of briefly but it touches on some of their upbringing, Panic Attacks (mentioned), Post-Episode: s01e02 Rising Malevolence, Tumblr Prompt, clone culture, that big sad (tm) thing with clones equating themselves to tools
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:28:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25458565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FluffNStuff/pseuds/FluffNStuff
Summary: "We are designed to be disposable, General. We are cogs in a machine, and like parts, we can be replaced," he said, even though he knew that Plo had heard this sentiment before. It was a saying they were taught from their youngest days of training. As clones, they were part of a much larger whole. The individual was not worth more than their collective duty.or Wolffe and Plo find a way to move forward after the Malevolence.
Relationships: Plo Koon & CC-3636 | Wolffe
Comments: 19
Kudos: 167





	Desaturated

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nadiavandyne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nadiavandyne/gifts).



> Based on a tumblr prompt LONG overdue from Navn! 
> 
> Just a few notes: This takes place after the Malevolence destroys Plo's fleet and the original 104th Battalion, which takes place in 22BBY. I'm using a Legends calendar system loftily called the 'Great ReSynchronization' even though it hilariously only lasts for 60 years, since using a calendar system that doesn't technically exist for 22 years made no sense to me. 
> 
> Also, we never really know HOW many troopers were lost in the Malevolence arc, a battalion in the wiki is only 576 men, but 3 Venator(?)-class Cruisers were destroyed which have crews of ~ 7,500. This hurt my brain to think about so I'm just gonna reference the 104th Battalion for this.
> 
> Also this heavily involves my headcanon that clone trooper armor color has significant meaning to the clones, much like Mandalorian armor.

> _CT-4113. KIA. 13:10:17. Abregado System. Enter._

_> CT-6719. KIA. 13:10:17. Abregado System. Enter. _

_CT Number. Date of death. Enter._

Wolffe typed designations and numbers into his datapad, trying not to visualize the faces that accompanied them. The task was as monotonous as it was painful. But Wolffe tried not to think about that. He had to keep going, keep serving, keep on task.

The words on the holoscreen were starting to blur. He wasn't sure how long he'd been sitting at his desk typing number after number. It was a task that had to be done, logging the dead. He'd just never had to do it for so many at once. He'd started to feel completely numb from it.

_> CT-0159. KIA. 13:10:17. Abregado System. Enter._

_CT Number. Date of death. Enter._

Wolffe heard the distant hiss of the door to his quarters, but he didn't look up, his gaze transfixed on the seemingly endless stream of numbers in front of him. From the nearly silent entrance he knew it was General Koon. He really should stand at attention to greet him. It was disrespectful to ignore him. He didn't look up. 

"Commander?" the familiar soft and muffled cadence of his General's voice made Wolffe's fingers stutter on the holokeys. He picked back up a moment later. 

_CT Number. Date of death. Enter._

"Commander, you're working in the dark," Plo pointed out gently, and Wolffe heard the soft swish of the General's robes as they swept across the floor. Wolffe chose not to respond. He didn't know what to say. "Would you like me to turn on your light?" the General asked. Wolffe swallowed roughly, glancing quickly up to Plo before back to the holoscreen, continuing his typing where he left off.

"No. Thank you, General," he said, his voice hoarse and scratchy from disuse. He'd meant it as a subtle dismissal, but he wasn't surprised when Plo made no move to leave. 

"You'll hurt your eyes staring at a holoscreen in the dark, Wolffe," and there was a thin thread of admonishment in Plo's tone. 

"I'm fine, Sir," Wolffe assured, even though he was undermined by the raspy edge to his voice. "I need to-" Wolffe swallowed with difficulty, his throat dry, "uh, I need to finish this report in order to send our troop replacement requisitions," he explained.

_CT Number. Date of death. Enter._

The General was quiet for several seconds, but Wolffe heard a barely-there shuffling as he walked across the room. When the General remained silent for longer than Wolffe expected, he finally ripped his gaze from his holoscreen and froze. 

Plo was standing in front of Wolffe's armor storage, turned slightly away from him with one hand pressed gently to the side of Wolffe's empty helmet. Wolffe had received his replacement armor in the last shipment to the Resolute, which was where the remainder of the 104th was stationed until their replacement cruiser arrived. It had felt a bit like a hard punch to the face to see his mended armor, shiny and new and perfect. He hadn't been able to put it on yet. Each time he'd tried, his chest had constricted to the point where he couldn't breathe. The last time he attempted it, he'd ended up stripping his kit off in such a rush that he'd hurled his vambrace across the room. He'd left it in storage ever since. Plo ran a careful finger down the deep maroon markings that Wolffe had once worn with pride and then lowered his head. 

"I'm sorry," Plo said, an audible strain in his quiet voice. "I have failed all of you as a General. You put your trust in my leadership, but I led us directly into a trap I could not forsee. I brought forth this destruction, and you and your brothers paid the price. It is an irreplaceable loss. It is not a mistake I will make again," he said with a surprisingly hard edge to his voice that Wolffe hadn't heard before. Plo's hand dropped from Wolffe's helmet and joined his other under the sleeves of his robe, his head bowing forward slowly in a gesture Wolffe recognized from their few months working together as the Kel Dor's acknowledgment of grief.

Wolffe had been surprised the first time the General had mourned for one of his fallen brothers. It was something his training had not prepared him for. He placed the lives of clones over the completion of a mission, something Wolffe had learned after failing to capture the Nexus during the siege of Hisseen. It was a quality that perhaps didn't make Plo Koon the most effective General from a tactical standpoint, but was what had earned him Wolffe's deepest respect nonetheless. Wolffe was also well-aware that his General's compassion was a considerable weakness in the tragedy of war. Because loss wasn't something they could avoid. 

"We are designed to be disposable, General. We are cogs in a machine, and like parts, we can be replaced," he said, even though he knew that Plo had heard this sentiment before. It was a saying they were taught from their youngest days of training. As clones, they were part of a much larger whole. The individual was not worth more than their collective duty.

"You are _people_ ," Plo insisted, just like Wolffe expected he would. It made a rueful smile twitch at the corner of Wolffe's mouth. Plo turned to him a bit more fully and it was hard to tell his expression in the dark, the blue glow from Wolffe's holoscreen casting a ghostly silhouette on the General. "You are not broken machinery to be cast aside and forgotten. We can replace the numbers of our troops, but we cannot replace the individuals we have lost. Do you really believe what you just said, Commander?" 

The question being turned on him made Wolffe stiffen in surprise. He'd never been asked that before and so openly. Plo must have known from how he had said the phrase that it was something Wolffe just repeated, but didn't truly believe. He's not sure he ever really believed it. It was one of the few teachings the _kaminiise_ attempted to instill that they never could get to stick. The bonds between _vode_ made it impossible to treat each other with the same coldness their creators regarded them with. They would parrot the phrase when needed, but few clones truly felt that their _vode_ were disposable. Fox, in a private conversation far away from prying ears, had even called it 'a manipulation tactic to make the nat-borns feel better about us dying in droves'.

But it was one thing to harbor such feelings in private or among brothers, it was another to deliberately renounce one of the core factors of their designed purpose to others, particularly a superior officer. So Wolffe stayed quiet. Plo waited patiently for him to respond, and when it was clear he wasn't going to the Kel Dor sighed. 

"I understand your hesitation in voicing such an opinion. And I apologize for asking that of you," he said with a small bow of his head. "If you could Commander, I would like for you to get some rest. Please forward me the report you are working on and I will finish it for you," he gestured vaguely to Wolffe's forgotten holoscreen. General Koon made it to the doorway before Wolffe finally broke his silence.

"I can't put on my armor," he burst, voice cracking. "I can't even look at it without seeing them. I've input over two-hundred numbers into this casualty report. Two-hundred brothers who had _names_. I can't- I've never-" Wolffe pulled in a ragged breath, clutching at the sides of his head. He flinched when he sensed the General's presence at his side. Plo telegraphed his movements so Wolffe was aware of precisely where he was, and laid a single clawed hand on Wolffe's shoulder, squeezing lightly. Wolffe choked back a quiet sob, biting heavily into his lip until he tasted blood, his eyes screwed shut. Plo knelt so he was closer to Wolffe's eye-level.

"Your burden is heavy, Commander. Heavier than most and weighed by your strong sense of duty," Plo said gently. 

"I've never felt so _useless_ , Sir," Wolffe whispered, voice brittle and broken. "I keep thinking, if I had been better prepared, or if I’d had my armor and could have helped I-" he cut himself off with a wet sob.

"You did the best you could, Commander, and the men you saved are alive thanks to your efforts in that pod with keeping our signal alive," Plo reasoned, his brow furrowed together with honest sincerity. Wolffe struggled to steady his breathing, taking several shallow breaths before finally managing a full inhale. His chest burned and his cheeks were wet and Plo was looking at him without an ounce of judgement. Wolffe looked up at the ceiling, tilting his head back.

"I don't want them to be forgotten, Sir. They're the 104th. They can't just... disappear. They can't be erased like that," he pleaded weakly. 

"As they live on in our hearts and the Force, they deserve to be honored; I agree Commander," Plo stood in a slow, fluid motion and made his way back to Wolffe's armor storage. Wolffe watched as he quietly took a vambrace from its resting place and brought it back to Wolffe's desk and offered it to him. "What do you see here, Commander?" Plo asked in that vaguely leading way that Jedi do when they're teaching some important philosophical lesson. Wolffe hesitated before taking the vambrace carefully from Plo's hands, turning it around in his own as he examined the painted markings. 

"My vambrace, Sir?" Wolffe asked, not entirely sure where the Jedi was heading with this. 

"You told me your armor reminds you of our battalion, tell me why," Plo encouraged, unhurried. Wolffe swallowed painfully, his fingers brushing over the fresh, unscuffed paint. Just looking at it made something painful spasm in his chest. 

"It's our colors, Sir," he answered, voice far away. 

"Your colors are as much a part of your battalion as the men are. Perhaps then, this shade can honor their memory. They were the 104th who wore red, it is theirs," Plo suggested, because he was compassionate and _cared._ He _knew_ how much their armor and their colors meant to clones. Their colors represented their _aliit_ , their family, their closest brothers. They wore their colors with pride and honor. Painting their armor meant being woven into a clan and protecting one another. His clan, his brothers, _his_ 104th was gone. Their colors would remain with them. Wolffe's fingers tightened around his vambrace as his voice caught in his throat. He spent several seconds just trying to get words past the lump in his throat, his hands trembling.

"Tha-thank you, Sir," he stammered out, his voice shaky and uncontrolled. But Plo had always encouraged the expression of emotion, and to not feel shame for the feelings that flowed through them. Wolffe had still always kept a tight lock on his own emotion around the men, because he had to stay strong as their Commander. But he was the lowest-ranking officer in the room at the moment. So he didn't hold back the grateful tears that fell from his eyes or the sobs that cracked from his throat. And Plo kept a steady, gentle hand on Wolffe's back as he cried through his grief. 

\---

Wolffe woke the next morning feeling like his eyes were glued together. He groaned and sat up rubbing at the uncomfortably tight feeling on his face. He didn't remember going to sleep the night before, or finishing his report. Belatedly he realized he must have passed out from exhaustion and the General must have carried him to his cot. 

Fox must _never_ know.

He scrubbed once more at his face before getting up. It was a bit later than he normally woke up, but he still had some time before the refectory started serving breakfast.

He stepped into the 'fresher, glancing in the mirror and scowling at how red his eyes were. He supposed that was expected, but he wouldn't be caught dead looking like this to his men or the men of the 501st. He pivoted in the small refresher and turned the water to his shower to just-under scalding. He washed the remaining tear tracks off of his face and let the water try and loosen some of the overly-tight muscles in his shoulders and back. He let his mind go blank and empty, deciding not to examine anything that happened the night before just yet. He stayed only a minute longer than his regular routine, then got dressed in fresh officer's greys. He opted out of shaving the now more prominent stubble on his face, but he was technically on leave, so it didn't really matter. 

He checked his chronometer and decided he had about two hours until he would be considered 'late' for breakfast, and sat down to finish the Abregado casualty report, or at least get further with it. He tapped in his passcode and the report popped immediately on screen. Except, it was finished. Wolffe double and triple checked and scrolled through the hundreds of designations multiple times before coming to the bottom of the report again to see his name along with the General's scrawled signature. A warm rush of gratefulness spread through his limbs and Wolffe had to fight to keep his composure.

Wolffe sprung up from his chair, grabbing his holster (habit) and practically ran from his quarters to search for the General. It was still early in the rotation, so there were just a few lone troopers and the stray group or two, each giving him a rushed salute as he barreled past. 

He finally tracked the Jedi down in the barracks, sitting on one of the cots with Boost and Sinker squished together across from him. Whatever he was saying, they were completely focused on him and didn't look up until Plo himself turned to acknowledge Wolffe's arrival. 

"Good morning Commander," be greeted serenely. 

"You finished my report, Sir," Wolffe said, wincing when it sounded a bit like an accusation. "You didn't have to do that," he added to soften it. Plo nodded his head solemnly. 

"I wanted you to get some rest, Commander. You needed it," he said, his hands curled in on each other, relaxed. 

"Yeah you look terrible, Commander," Boost grinned, but Wolffe let him have it since that was how the kid coped. 

"I think we should do it, Sir," Sinker said, looking at Wolffe with steely, sad eyes. "If there's any way we can honor them, it's that," he smiled tightly and couldn't hold eye contact. Wolffe looked at Plo, realizing that he had gone to ask them their permission to change their colors, because he respected their opinions. 

"I agree, Sir," Boost added, the humor gone from his voice. "It doesn't feel right, wearing their colors," he looked to Sinker and grimaced and Sinker nodded, gripping his _vod_ firmly on the shoulder. 

"You got a color in mind, Wolffe?" Sinker asked, looking back at him. He was giving Wolffe the choice. Wolffe thought for a moment and then cleared his throat, not trusting his voice not to crack again.

"I think grey," he said carefully. Because every clone knew what grey armor meant. They'd gleaned their roots from Mandalorian culture, and color could speak for itself. Grey was for mourning. Because by acknowledging their loss and their grief, Wolffe and the little remainder of the 104th was saying 'we are not disposable and we will not forget'. Grey was their mourning, but also their defiance. 

Plo nodded approvingly at him. Wolffe didn't know if the Jedi knew about the color meanings they were utilizing, but he must have felt the gnawing, determined conviction rise in Wolffe's chest at the declaration. The General scooted over to the side of the cot, gesturing for Wolffe to sit down. Wolffe nodded gratefully and sat next to him. 

Sinker grinned fiercely, tears in the corners of his eyes as he grasped Wolffe's hand in a tight grip. Wolffe reached out and held Boost's hand as the trooper tried to keep his composure. They sat in their isolated circle, holding each other together. 

"Grey it is, then" Sinker said, eyes bright. 

"Grey it is," Wolffe agreed.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi or send me ideas on tumblr! @koyacyi-vode!! I'm a bit slow at the moment for content because I'm working on a huge deadline for my student film, but keep a list of prompts that I plan to do!!


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